What is in Resistance?

The people, the army, the Resistance. Lebanon’s longstanding formula, where “resistance” is a euphemism for the Shiite political party and militia Hezbollah, has become a national mantra repeated often in recent years.  This so-called golden equation, however, is being reevaluated as Hezbollah has redefined its resistance operations in a way that could further destabilize Lebanon.

What is Hezbollah up to, and has it miscalculated the delicate calculus of Lebanese politics?

For years Hezbollah has been Lebanon’s de facto military adjunct responsible for operations against Israel, and for years many Lebanese have supported the group’s efforts to, in its words, “liberate” three disputed areas along the country’s southern border currently held by Israel: the Shebaa farms, the hills surrounding the town of Kfarshouba, and half of the Ghajar village.

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Hezbollah gained broad, though certainly not unanimous, support by framing itself as a patriotically motivated guerilla force equipped and determined to reclaim these areas and to prevent Israeli aggression in Lebanon.

In 2008, two years after a bloody summer war between Hezbollah and Israel, the country’s Sunni-led unity government officially mentioned “the people, army, resistance” equation in a ministerial statement, thus lending further legitimacy to the group’s operations.

While it may seem unfathomable that a government would allow a paramilitary force to operate openly within its borders, Lebanon and Israel are still technically at war. Israel occupied a large swath of South Lebanon until 2000, a full ten years after the country’s bloody civil war ended. Hezbollah, which engaged in repeated guerilla attacks against Israeli positions in South Lebanon during the occupation, is credited with forcing Israel’s withdrawal. Needless to say, there is no love lost between the two countries.

The sectarian tinge to Hezbollah’s new operations has increased tensions in Lebanon and intensified confessional rifts.

But since Hezbollah publicly announced that it was sending fighters to Syria to shore up the forces of Bashar al-Assad in May 2013, Hezbollah has drastically revised its narrative. Hezbollah now claims that resistance is necessary not only against Israel but against radical Sunni groups like ISIS and the Nusra Front.

While the majority of Lebanese Sunnis do not profess any particular sympathy for either ISIS or Nusra, many are supportive of the Syrian opposition which has been led by the country’s Sunni majority.

The sectarian tinge to Hezbollah’s new operations has increased tensions in Lebanon and intensified confessional rifts.

Hezbollah claims that if it had not sent troops into Syria, particularly in areas along Lebanon’s borders, fundamentalist groups would have swept through Syria and Eastern Lebanon, arriving at Beirut’s doorstep.

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In August, militants affiliated with ISIS and the Nusra Front clashed with Lebanese security forces in the North Eastern town of Arsal. When the dust settled after five days of fighting, the groups had taken more than twenty Lebanese soldiers and policemen hostage.

The key condition of the captives release, the groups say, is Hezbollah’s withdrawal from Syria.

Sunni politicians blamed the Arsal Fiasco on Hezbollah, saying the group’s involvement in Syria had drawn Lebanon into a broader regional conflict. Hezbollah sympathizers have suggested that presence of ISIS in Lebanon proves that the group is fighting religious extremists who use dirty tactics to achieve their ends.

The situation was further complicated earlier this month when Nusra Front militants attacked several Hezbollah outposts in Eastern Lebanon, killing at least ten of the group’s fighters. While such clashes occur frequently on the Syrian side of the border, it was the first time Hezbollah and Nusra had exchanged blows on Lebanese soil, adding an unnerving new dimension to the country’s already precarious security situation. The Lebanese army did not intervene in the conflict.

Nasrallah, who is rarely seen in public, travelled to the Eastern border twice last week to boost morale among the troops. “I assure you that our we are still very strong; our preparations are highly advanced and our plans are well schemed,” he said.

Two days after the battle, an explosive device was detonated in the Shebaa farms area, injuring two Israeli soldiers. Hezbollah claimed responsibility for the attack, the first time it has done so since the 2006 war.

“This is a message,” said Hezbollah’s second-in command Naim Qassem said after the attack. “Even though we are busy in Syria and on the eastern front in Lebanon our eyes remain open and our resistance is ready to confront the Israeli enemy."

One thing is certain: not everyone is buying Hezbollah’s editorialized definition of “resistance.”

So what’s next? Renewed hostilities on the Israeli front? A full-scale war against Sunni extremists in Eastern Lebanon? No one knows.

One thing is certain: not everyone is buying Hezbollah’s editorialized definition of “resistance.”

Lebanon’s Interior Minister Nouhad Mashnouk launched a tirade against “partisan immunity” in the country this week, a thinly veiled critique at the fact that Hezbollah fights openly in Syria while those affiliated with the opposition groups are arrested by Lebanese security forces. He then accused an unnamed security institution, most likely Military Intelligence, of harboring a pro-Hezbollah bias.

A Lebanese soldier defected earlier this month and joined the Nusra Front saying that the army had become a “tool of Hezbollah” to oppress Sunnis.

It’s still unclear whether Hezbollah’s editorialized definition of resistance will drag Lebanon back into civil war. Regardless, it is clear that the group’s expanded military operations are not furthering much needed national unity.